RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) - Workers were dismantling a scaffold at a high-rise construction project on Monday when a piece of it fell to the ground in downtown Raleigh, killing three men and sending another to a hospital.
All four men were involved in the construction of Charter Square, a glass and steel building in downtown Raleigh, said Jeffrey Hammerstein, community outreach chief for Wake County EMS.
A 911 caller told the operator that men were working on the scaffold when it fell about 11 a.m. The equipment, known as a mast climber scaffold, moves up and down a building's facade to take workers to different floors.
"We just had a mast climber fall off. There were men on it," the caller said, estimating the men fell 200 feet.
The operator asked if the victims were awake, to which the caller responded: "No, they're dead."
The accident happened as subcontractor Associated Scaffolding was in the process of dismantling the scaffold on the building's exterior, said Mike Hampton, the chief operating officer for the building's general contractor, Choate Construction Company.
"We are finished using it. They actually were dismantling that piece when it happened," Hampton said. "It wasn't as if it was business as usual; they went to work and it collapsed."
Choate issued a statement saying the company is "deeply saddened by the loss of life and injuries."
Police identified the dead men as Jose Erasmo Hernandez, 41, of Durham; Jose Luis Lopez-Ramirez, 33, of Clinton; and Anderson Almeida, 33, of Durham.
A fourth man, Elmer Guevara, 53, was taken to the hospital, said authorities, who didn't know his hometown and didn't update his condition.
Peter Thuston was working inside the building installing a security card reader system when the accident happened.
He said he ran outside to try to help and saw three men in safety harnesses, leading him to believe that they had been attached to the scaffolding.
"It was just a loud crash and a huge cloud of smoke," said Thuston, 32, of Garner. "I noticed three of the guys and it looked like they were dead."
Guevara, wearing a safety harness, was found on a crushed portable toilet after apparently falling onto it. He was still breathing and had a pulse, but was barely responsive.
Thuston said he had walked inside minutes before the accident.
"That could have been anybody. That could have been me," he said.
The scaffolding that fell was attached to the side of the new building.
One of the tracks had snapped off several stories up and fallen into a twisted heap on the ground below.